A human rights tribunal has ordered an Ontario packaging company to pay nearly $187,000 to a developmentally disabled woman who was paid $1.25 an hour for years before being laid off along with all the other disabled people at the company.

The complaint said the company fired Garrie in October of 2009, and fired all the remaining disabled employees within a month, while continuing to employ non-disabled workers.

Ontario's minimum wage is $10.25 an hour, and will be rising to $11 per hour in June. The company argued its pay to disabled workers was a “training honorarium” and said workers were free to look at magazines or play cards during work time.

The tribunal had initially rejected Garrie's claim for back pay, arguing that because her employment there started in 1999, the complaint brought in 2012 was too old. But the tribunal reversed that decision last fall, and issued a new ruling last week.

Garrie was "thrilled" with the decision, according to the Star.

"I'm very happy (the case) is over and done with," she said in a phone interview. "I don't want to see this happen again to anyone else."